Back in the TV World (Invite Only)

[mugenginga]

As it was, both teens were down. This fight was going oh so well for them. Yuugi winced as Astaroth seemed to not be faring well. It was a choice between trying to help the demon keep fighting or attempting to get something done about his own broken leg. He finally gestured towards Nefertum thanks to Astaroth's ability to heal himself. He didn't have to say anything, Nefertum got the meaning from the gesture. Due to Yuugi's injury, however, Nefertum wasn't moving as fast as he could. And the next attack that came from the outstretched claw of the bird creature hit all three members of the group.

Yuugi screamed, trying vainly to huddle into a defensive position. Nefertum's form flickered, and Yuugi's hand's fell in front of him as he caught himself from falling more than he had. The bird had used Maragion, and apparently Yuugi was a bit more susceptible to fire than it was likely any member of the group had known. And as if things weren't bad enough, two more Agidyne's shot at the snake riding demon from the two cross-like scales.

[Firebreath Fishslap]

"Yuugi!" K1 yelled, and turned to the teen. "Astaroth, forget healing yourself, heal Yuugi!"

The snake riding demon moved around to face Yuugi, and just as he was about to use the last of his power to heal him, those last couple of Agidynes hit him, and the demon faded away.

"Not good..." K1 mumbled. He summoned another demon, this time Cerberus. "Cerberus, Shield All! Please!"

The demon glowed with a yellow energy that eventually formed into a weak aura around K1 and Yuugi. That would block one attack, but only one. After that, they were done for.

[mugenginga]

It's unknown where the conscious mind goes in complete panic mode. But its highly likely that the subconscious is active, somehow. The way one can live in a dream while the body sleeps. It was this aspect of the conscious and subconscous that allowed Nefertum to cast Dia on Yuugi even though the teen was still in pain. It is what he would have ordered, after all. But in the artficial world of gaming numbers, he was still dangerously low on hit points. Nefertum and Yuugi turned towards the enemy as more fire shot at them, bouncing off the aura and shattering it. K1 was right. They couldn't run, not with Yuugi in the condition he was in. Nefertum's Dia spells were merely preventing the teen from dying, there simply wasn't enough energy to effect his leg.

The bird creature prepared to fire another Maragion, and the gold cross-like scales flashed with unholy energy...

[Firebreath Fishslap]

And then, at that moment, several large shards of ice froze around and flew at the shadows, causing the three of them to fade away. Standing down the hall was Minato, with the evoker to his head, and a sort of priestess wearing a large hat and cape standing in front of him. Souji stood a little to the side. The Persona, Scathach, faded away, as Minato and Souji ran over to Yuugi and K1.

"What are we going to do with you two?" Minato asked. Brigid approached K1, bringing more light to the room. Not much, though.

"...Sorry," K1 said. "Yuugi's leg's broken. Brigid, can you heal him up?" The demon nodded, and walked over to Yuugi as she started to get to work healing him with Diarama.

[mugenginga]

Yuugi jerked back as well as one could in a sitting position with a badly broken leg as he heard the sounds of the Shadows being destroyed. Brigid's light was a relief, it informed Yuugi that the others had found them. He looked up and over to them. He didn't know how many floors down he was, but that had seemed really fast. He looked extremely guilty at Minato's comment, and had to quickly close his eyes as the leg began repairing itself. The pants of his school uniform had a fair amount of blood on them, but surprisingly they weren't ripped.

Yuugi winced as the sounds of bone healing reached his ears. It was a grinding sound, and more disturbing than most he'd heard. Somehow he thought nails on a chalkboard would sound better. It took two applications of the spell, and he wasn't honestly sure he'd be able to stand. He tried, and looked wobbly as he convinced himself it was fine. He looked behind him and noticed a set of stone stairs. They were the same stupidly steep variety the rest of this world had.

"T-Thank you... I'm sorry I worried you so much," it was rather obvious. Although Minato had a kind of exasperated kind look on his face. Souji's was a mix of exhaustion, annoyance, and worry. Minato's was far more reassuring.

"Um... What's your name?" Yuugi asked Brigid. He remembered the incident with Rangda. Brigid certainly didn't have the scowl Rangda sported, but he didn't want to insult her. Actually, he wanted to ask if she'd go over to the hieroglyphics. He remembered his own World. Was it possible Atem's did the same thing? Not that he was anywhere near fluent in Egyptian, but he could try. He didn't want a repeat of what had just happened.

It was possible it would surprise Souji and Minato. Many would interpert the demons names to be their "race" name. Yuugi knew better after the conversation with Neti.

[Firebreath Fishslap]

Brigid gave a small smile. "My name is Ea, but Brigid works well enough for my master."

K1 glanced down the hallway at the stairs. "We should keep going. Yuugi, you feeling alright?" The question was less about his physical state and more about his mental state. This place was still basically Atem's mind. He was sure that Yuugi wasn't feeling too hot.

Souji glanced at the Evoker. Minato's hand was shaking. He'd appeared to have control over that persona he'd summoned, but Minato's hand didn't shake like that during the Dark Hour, from what Souji had noticed. Or before when they'd been fighting shadows in the floors above. Minato had practically torn through the shadows before, but now, in this particularly dark hallway, he didn't seem to be doing so good.

[mugenginga]

Yuugi looked towards K1 and gave a weak smile. Honestly? No, he was feeling extremely nervous. He'd been inside Atem's mind room before, and this place had traces of that. But... it was overpoweringly stronger. How much did a person's conscious mind hold back the truth of the mind room? Shadi would probably know better than him. He shook his head slightly to try and rid the thoughts and pointed towards the wall, "Ea-san, could you go over there? It's too dark for me to get a good look at the hieroglyphs."

Yuugi glanced towards Minato. That was a reaction he hadn't seen before, but he quickly turned his attention back towards the wall. It was likely Minato was just tired. At least he hoped... maybe he was overthinking things. Atem's mind room was fairly oppressing, this place was worse. Why did that frame of thought feel like rationalization...?
-----

Atem opened his eyes. The thought of how many times this had happened didn't even occur to him. Some time ago he'd stopped caring. He couldn't recall ever feeling this tired.

"You prove your thoughts well, don't you?"

He jerked his head up and saw... his shadow. It had to be. The normally purple eyes had a trace of yellow to them and were extremely dark. The Shadow stood up and Atem fought to stay conscious, managing to succeed. It didn't help when he realized it was likely the Shadow's will that was keeping him awake. He tried to push himself to his feet, but managed only to get to his knees.

"What do you mean?" he asked it.

[Firebreath Fishslap]

Ea nodded and walked over to the wall.

K1 glanced back at her before turning back to Souji and Minato. "How much further do we have to go?"

"You two fell down four floors. It can't be much further," Souji stated. K1 was still having a hard time taking him seriously with those glasses on. Still, he winced.

"That... would explain why I'm still hurting so much," K1 said. Minato smiled and reholstered the Evoker.

[mugenginga]

Yuugi squinted at the hieroglyphics. Among all the... well, chattering his ears off Yuugi's grandfather had done, one of the topics had been hieroglyphics. Egypt in general, really. It had picked up a bit more after he finished the Puzzle, and it always increased when his grandfather's American friend visited. That had been interesting... Rebecca had been rather clingy. And quite a bit younger than him, yet another disadvantage of his height.

However, it surprised him that he was able to piece together the meaning of these glyphs. He could... he turned towards the other teens, "I know this might be a lot to ask... but I think we can get down there a lot faster if I can get a Persona or Demon with a... "Mudo" and a "Hama" based skill," Yuugi scratched his head, "I hope that makes more sense to you than it does to me..."

He remembered Hama vaguely, K1 had reflected something that Souji had called Hama. He couldn't recall if he'd heard the term Mudo before, though. It wasn't an ability his Persona had, in any case.

[Firebreath Fishslap]

K1 sighed. "I don't think I've got anything like that... I've never even heard of anything like that..."

"Hama skills are light based instant kill spells. Mudo skills are dark based instant kill spells." Souji explained. "I think Alice will work for the Mudo skill, with her Die for Me! attack... Minato-san, do you have a persona that can use Hama skills?"

Minato nodded.

[mugenginga]

Yuugi twitched a bit at the name of Alice's attack. That... yeah. He shook his head and pointed at a spot on the wall, "From what I can tell... both of them need to hit at the same time at this spot here. It'll open up a shortcut that will take us several floors down."

Actually, the hieroglyphs loosely said, "The unison of the light of Hama and the dark of Mudo will open the path sought by both." However, the implications of that in combination with the show Atem's Shadow put on last night... Yuugi covered his face with his hands. He hoped the others would read it as worry or tiredness, not the embarassment it was. They were fast approaching a confrontation that he wasn't sure he wanted to have an audience for...
-----

"Your skills with figuring out puzzles and riddles should be more than enough. Or is your weakness getting in the way? You are weak..."

Atem shook his head. From what Souji had said and what he'd seen of Yuugi's Shadow, his Shadow was trying to upset him. And it wasn't like he was saying anything he wouldn't admit to himself, "I know that."

The Shadow grinned darkly and looked Atem in the eyes, "And you want to destroy others, crush them under your heel to prove that thought wrong. You don't start your games to protect people, you start them to protect your ego."

Atem's head jerked up. No... he started them to protect Yuugi... and his friends... he turned away. He couldn't let the Shadow get to him! But he was so tired...

[Firebreath Fishslap]

Minato and Souji both stepped in front of that spot, and summoned their personas, Minato's by Evoker, and Souji's by tarot card. Almost immidiately Minato's hand started shaking again, but he still held his Evoker to his head as Melchizedek and Alice both materialized. Alice shot her tarot cards at the wall, while Melchizedek attacked several glowing white spell tags to that same point on the wall.

K1 stood back and waited.

[mugenginga]

The attacks connected at the same moment and what could only be described as a small explosion occured. It seemed as if the spell tags formed a barrier for the explosion caused by the tarot cards, and they both pushed inward. The symbol on the wall shimmered in a kind of dark rainbow manner that fans of Yuugiou might remember Atem's third eye doing during Mind Crushes. The shimmering light spread outwards and the wall vanished, revealing stairs.

Yuugi looked towards the group, "I'll head first..." he said. He was forcing himself forward and it was painfully obvious. He stepped onto the exposed stairs, keeping his hand on the wall for balance. He wasn't sure how quick the descent would be...
-----

"And you can't even look the truth in the eye, can you? Of course not," the Shadow moved so that its eyes locked with Atem's, "Your abilities are self-serving. You protect others because you're afraid of being alone. You protect others because you're weak and know you can't survive without them. Why else would you have gone beserk over losing your partner? Why did you even use that Seal of Orichalchos?"
-----

Yuugi saw the flickering "light" of the Channel. He swallowed hard and came out of the opening. Shadow Atem's eyes flicked towards Yuugi as it continued.

"Because you can't bear to lose. Be it a game or your friends," the grin shifted to one of pure evil, "The one you care for the most but are too weak to admit it to..."

Atem found the energy to stand. He had gotten flustered enough that he hadn't noticed the Shadow's gaze shift for the split second. He took a step back, but he was obviously shaky. And Yuugi was so... well, he was bright red. Was that Shadow indicating what he thought it was. For a split second, he forgot the group was behind him, and as such blocked their entry into the room with where he was standing.

(OOC: Despite Yuugi being in the way of getting out, feel completely free to have the group hear that last bit by Atem's Shadow. In fact, I encourage it.)

[Firebreath Fishslap]

Souji ended up running into Yuugi once he stopped, and without thinking, pushed the smaller teen out of the way to get through.

"Hey, Souji!" K1 yelled. Souji ignored him and stepped forward. This wasn't good. It looked like Atem was at his limit now, and it was a matter of time before the Shadow went berserk.

"Prepare for battle," Souji ordered the rest of the group. He turned to Atem. "Atem! Don't say it!"

[mugenginga]

Yuugi stumbled to the side as Souji pushed him. He wasn't the type to get angry over that, and even if he was the situation had him too worried to do so. He did almost fall, but he managed to grab onto a gold statue of Anubis. He looked over to Atem.

Atem jerked his head towards Souji, but his eyes quickly passed over when he saw Yuugi. He looked mildly relieved, at least as much as his current level of exhaustion would allow. Things would be okay now. He jerked his head forward as his Shadow grabbed onto his his shirt collar and quite literally threw him into the gold "throne" to the side.

"Atem!" Yuugi shouted, obviously about to step forward to try and help the Pharaoh.

The shadow looked up and glared, "You're incorrect in assuming I won't kill you just because I care for you."

Yuugi almost faceplanted at that comment. At least he stopped. Atem pushed himself up a bit. His head actually had a small cut in in from the impact, "L-leave him alone..."

The Shadow smirked, "Of course. If I killed them you'd be helpless."

Atem opened his mouth to say something, but quickly shut it. Souji's warning rang through his mind. The Shadow's form flickered briefly, but it didn't shift to its monster form. It was unclear if Atem's friends would pick up on this, but the Pharaoh had a good chokehold on his subconscious at the moment. He was forcing it to not go beserk as he struggled to get to his feet. The dark glare of the Shadow showed that something was going on, however. Atem wasn't accepting it, he was trying to smother it...